Does anyone wonder what compassion is? Do you , like me, feel you have an enormous amount of it? Do you, like me, look at other people and feel an immediate compassion for their circumstances, but are secretly grateful that you aren’t in their circumstances? Do you, like me, think you know what compassion is? I thought I knew what compassion was.. My friends would tell you that I am a extremely compassionate person. Truthfully, I was born that way, even as a child I felt things others felt, I felt their pain, their happiness, joy, anger, I can still feel the energy of another person. Most of the time I was considered a sensitive child and somehow learned that it was wrong. I recognized early on that I did not want to be the cause bad feelings in anyone. I remember from an extremely young age trying to please, protect and help my family.
I feel like this ability to empathize with others has helped me a great deal in my career of being a hairdresser, I connect with with people. I love connecting with people it feeds my soul. I love to hear their stories, look in their eyes and truly see them for who they are, where they been and where they are going. I have to ask myself however, do I truly have compassion with every living being on our planet.. The person who just about hit me, the drunk driver at 6:00 a.m. or the person who has just irritated the heck out of me… In those circumstances I am pretty sure I am just like most people.. screaming profanities in my car wondering what the HELL… they are thinking!
Buddha’s defines compassion as this: Compassion is a mind that is motivated by cherishing other living beings and wishes to release them from their suffering.
If I judge myself against this definition then I am so FAR away from having compassion for all living beings. My goodness.. I recently killed a spider after I had decided I wasn’t going to kill anything every again. Then I see it crawling around the salon and just couldn’t stop myself.. it was over before it began… my first instinct, was to get rid of it at all COSTS. I have killed countless things in my life . Will all that bad karma continue with me to another life? Has it already followed me in this life? I certainly pray not. I hope that my enlightenment which started the day I left Arizona in January is where I will be held accountable for my actions. So how do I clear the karma from knowingly killing a spider when I had decided to not to do that any more? How do I clear the karma of thoughts, words, deeds that weren’t in line with “compassion” or seeing others through the soul? Good question more thoughts on that later.
Learning Compassion in this new sense is a challenge.. It means I have to soul deep have compassion for all living things. The good, bad and the ugly. (spiders included) compassion for a complete stranger who is standing on the street corner begging for money to feed their family. I believe that I was called to love , empathize and see things most can’t see, no matter what their circumstances are, having true compassion, I am called to lend a hand, true compassion means learning to love with an open heart, open mind and open soul.
How can I love with out reservation? How do you love with that level of openness? Someone recently said I was a little guarded? Is that possible? How do you bring down the walls that guard your heart after such pain and love like a child loves? Freely, openly, without abandon! Aren’t all humans born with some sort of guard (or is that a learned behavior) in place to protect themselves? If so, how do we as adults tear that guard down layer by layer, brick by brick? Humans have a great capacity for love but also a great capacity for causing and inflicting pain; some pain is so deep you are forever altered.
How do we break the guard, break the barriers.. I think, I know with all my being, that it starts with LOVE… see through the facade, the mask, the earthly body directly into the eyes and through to the soul! Easier said than done… Its a journey of a million miles which starts with me today and now! Namaste
